


Faith discerns the things of God

by NyakoChan



Category: Oxenfree
Genre: Five Stages of Grief, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Mentions of Cancer, Minor Character Death, Pre-Canon, Religious Conflict
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-22
Updated: 2017-09-22
Packaged: 2019-01-04 05:08:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12162159
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NyakoChan/pseuds/NyakoChan
Summary: Jonas deals with the loss of his mother and learns to accept a new one





	Faith discerns the things of God

It was raining when she died. A heavy downpour without any thunder or lightning to make for a rather unremarkable night on such a horribly tragic day. For Jonas, he felt like the sky opening up and dumping an ocean of water on them was like some sort of sign that it was time.

His mother had been fighting cancer for three and a half years before it had gotten the best of her, and Jonas found himself and his father at her bedside, too numb to cry or beg. He felt like the sky was crying for him for when he could not, and he found himself cursing every deity in existence for allowing his mother, of all people, to be taken away too early. 

His mother, a relatively devoted Methodist, had always given him the choice to choose his religion and never forced him to accept anything as the singular truth of the world. When he was small, he had plenty of faith and curiosity, and as he got older he became much less interested. His mother never seemed to mind, and had offered to pray for the both of them before bed every night. Jonas didn’t see a point in it but he respected her choice as she respected his.

It was after she had first fallen ill that Jonas wondered if he should have tried praying, or if he should have tried harder to be faithful to some higher being. There were times that Jonas was sorely tempted to try and pray, to voice his fears and frustrations to someone, but he hesitated, because what if it didn’t work? Since he was small, his mother had always told him that faith discerns the things of God, but he never really understood what she meant. 

Even as she grew sicker and sicker, his mother was ever faithful and would occasionally watch mass on television from her beside. Once she was moved into the hospital for closer observation Jonas visited as often as he could, telling her all about the things he did and saw that day, the things she couldn’t leave her bed to see. In turn she would tell him crazy stories she saw from her hospital bedside, the stories some of the doctors and nurses shared with her on the occasion. They played card games and word games at her bedside, joking and laughing, anything to take their minds off of the looming threat of her sickness. 

There was one day he had asked her if she was praying for God to cure her and make her better. She told him that what she really hoped for was to see him graduate high school and walk across the school stage to get his diploma. That was her dream. Jonas told her not to talk like that, because of course, of course she would be there for it. Even if they had to videotape it and bring it over, she would see him walk.

She didn’t make it through his junior year of high school. She took a sharp left turn for the worse early in the second semester. Jonas had been having a pretty shit year already. Teachers whispered comments that he used to be such a good student, never so irritable and temperamental. They didn’t know what kind of stress he lived with, the sharp, piercing blade of fear that he always clung to, as his mother got weaker and weaker. They didn’t hear some of the things the other students said about his mother. 

That Monday Jonas had been called to leave class early. His heart leapt up to his throat and a million questions and fears spun through his head. He was dizzy and he wanted to lie down and never get up again. The pouring rain was like an omen to him, and when he met his father at the school entrance he lowered his gaze, angry at the world and his school and his shitty situation. The closer they got to the hospital, the more and more he wanted to curl up and die before they could get there, or maybe, if he was lucky, a truck would t-bone them or a car would hydroplane into them.

Jonas barely listened to the frantically whispered words his father spoke to his mother with. Reassurances that he wouldn’t let himself remain alone and unhappy for the rest of his life, that she understood if he found someone else to keep him company in the time he had left. He assured her that Jonas would be just fine with him and they would never, ever forget her. He told her that she could rest easy, and know that the two of them would keep on keeping on. Somehow.

Jonas thought something had stuck in his throat when it came time for him to say his goodbyes. He felt as though a couple of jenga blocks had been lodges sideways in his throat, preventing him from speaking. His head hurt and behind his eyes hurt and he didn’t know if he wanted to prolong this moment forever, or get it over with. He didn’t want to say goodbye, but he didn’t want to see her suffer. He finally managed to tell her that he would make her proud, and that he and his dad would look out for each other. He assured her that they would meet again someday.

She died on a miserable Monday night, where the sky cried for him and he wished for all the world to join her right then and there. He couldn’t look away no matter how much he didn’t want to be in that room where the body of his mother lay. Jonas didn’t move as doctors and nurses moved around them, offering their condolences to the two of them and telling them what happened next. Jonas didn’t hear a single word that they said. He was too busy cursing and spitting at any high being listening. If there was any kind of god out there, how could they be so cruel to a woman that had been so loyal and loving? If there really was a “God” he wouldn’t have taken away such a faithful believer.

Jonas didn’t even know how they had gotten home that night -- or was it morning now?-- but he fell into a dreamless sleep that staved off his heartache for a few hours. When he awoke he felt like he hadn’t slept at all. He spent the rest of his Tuesday lying in bed, drifting in and out of consciousness but never really sleeping. He didn’t have the energy to do anything or talk to anyone. His dad stood outside his locked door, asking him to eat something, telling him that Mom wouldn’t want this for him. It was a slow process, but Jonas eventually got into a mechanical routine that fulfilled the minimum requirements for existing. 

His dad made him go to school and he physically attended most of his classes, but he definitely didn’t take a damn thing in. His grades fell gradually, his homework came in half finished at best. His teachers tried to give him some mercy because of his mother passing, but he was eventually failing at least two of his classes and very close to failing another. His classmates thought he was stupid when he turned in less and less of his homework or couldn’t finish his tests. Sometimes they laughed and called him a slacker or an idiot. 

His pain numbed him slowly, he missed her more and more every day. His dad, worried for his grades and reclusiveness, had asked him if he would want to attend a therapist or talk to someone, but Jonas declined it, promising to start doing better. He didn’t want to talk to anyone about it. He didn’t want them to know how scared and hurt he was, or that sometimes, when his mood fluctuated to angry, he sometimes blamed his mother for dying. Jonas kicked himself whenever that thought crossed his mind. 

His dad was hurting too, and it was something that was easy to forget while he wallowed in his own misery. His dad had a different way of showing it, tightening the leash on Jonas and restricting him from doing things that would have never been a problem before. His curfew was earlier now, and Jonas had to text him every few hours if he went out. 

Sometimes Jonas felt his temper run short and he and his father would explode on each other over nothing, over stupid things. They didn’t talk about it after, they didn’t apologize. Just left it to blow over and continued as they were. The house was stifling on a good day, and unbearable and restrictive any other day. 

When Jonas’s father went on vacation months after his mother’s passing, something about him was different when he came back a week later. After learning that it was some other woman he had met, Jonas started snapping back easier, lashing out in anger that his father could move on so quickly. Didn’t he miss Mom at all? Didn’t it still hurt?

Out of spite, he stayed out later, didn’t answer the phone or call back when his father tried checking up on him. He smoked in his room now, even though he had never lit up in the house because his mother hated the smell. His dad would yell and chastise him but Jonas just tuned him out, looking off to the side and letting him berate him. Jonas would shoot back at him that he was betraying Mom, that he was the one that was hurting her memory, not him. They didn’t speak to each other much for the next week and a half. Jonas couldn’t imagine moving on from her.

Later when Jonas was suspended from school for punching another boy in the mouth for making jokes about his mom, his dad said nothing to him, not even telling him off for getting suspended for a week.

It wasn’t until his dad tentatively introduced his new girlfriend to him over dinner that Jonas realized she was a good person. She wasn’t there to replace the spot of his mother, but rather, she had also lost someone important in her family and was equally in need of company to stand by her. Jonas didn’t talk to her much, busy mulling over his thoughts and picking at his food, but at the end of it he didn’t give the two adults any grief about the dinner or their relationship. He still couldn’t bring himself to completely agree with his father’s choice to see someone else, but his dad laughing and smiling again was enough reason not to give them too much trouble.

His dad was allowing himself to heal and move on, Jonas later realized barely a year later as his father sat him down and asked him his opinion on getting a new sister and a new mother. He didn’t even have to call her Mom if he didn’t want to. They’d be moving into her house and he’d be going to a new school where he’d meet new people who didn’t know anything about his situation. Jonas told him to do whatever makes him happy, just so long as they could still make visits to Mom’s grave together. 

In the past year since his mother’s death, time had slowly but surely softened the wound to his heart. He still wasn’t sure if he wanted to believe in a deity, but he wanted to believe his mother was in a good place now. He didn’t if praying would reach her or not, so he preferred to go to her gravesite and talk to her stone. He visited it more and more the closer they got to moving out, feeling like the bandaid was being pulled off his scabbing cut, like they were leaving her behind. He wanted to be mad at someone for taking him away from her again, but he knew that this was better for his father, better for him as well.

It was a Monday that his father and new step-mother got married. There was promise of a storm later but for now it gently drizzled, only slightly dampening the ground outside of the reception hall where Jonas stood smoking, thinking. He was only stopping by for a bit and although he wouldn’t get to meet his new step-sister today, they would be meeting after Jonas and his father finished moving the rest of their stuff over tomorrow. Apparently she had plans to take him out and see things, as her mother had informed him. Probably something to get them out of the house so they could enjoy some alone time. 

Jonas snubbed out his cigarette into an ash bin beside the entrance, looking into the grey sky and wondering if his mother was watching them now, if these were her tears shed for them. There was still a tiny part in the back of his mind that wanted it to be just his dad and him as a family, but for the most part, he was glad for his father having found a new partner to stay at his side, and hoped only the best for the two. 

Fingers crossed, Jonas hoped meeting his new step-sister tomorrow night didn’t completely suck.

**Author's Note:**

> Just wanted to make Jonas sad so I typed it up at work


End file.
